Name: Dr. Matthew Whitaker
Current Profession(s): Executive Director, George Washington Carver Museum & Cultural Center
Please describe your role(s) in your profession(s): Matthew C. Whitaker, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the George Washington Carver Museum and Cultural Center in Phoenix, Arizona. He is also the Founder and CEO of Diamond Strategies, LLC., a Better Business Bureau A+ rated, NSDMC certified Minority Business Enterprise (MBE), and trend-setting justice, equity, diversity, inclusion (JEDI), leadership, Interest-Based-Resolution (IBR), and community relations firm.
The George Washington Carver Museum & Cultural Center is a premier cultural institution that is the steward of the African American experience in Phoenix. With deep connections in the community and bold personality, Carver brings history, art, artists, and communities together to support creativity, Black knowledge systems, and restorative justice, at every level. As an open forum for exploring the artistic process, "Carver" fosters creativity and socio-economic advancement through curation, education programs, and the holistic exploration of Black history and life—all under one roof and throughout the community. In short, we honor and share Arizona's African American heritage, arts, and culture through collecting, exhibiting, and preserving Black history and life in Arizona.
Please describe your pathway to your current profession(s): Dr. Whitaker is a native of Phoenix, Arizona. His mother, Covey L. Whitaker, and father, Rev. Michael L. Hopwood, raised him amidst a diverse and loving family in Phoenix's south and westsides. At an early age, Dr. Whitaker began playing the piano, in addition to serving as the Assistant Superintendent of Sunday school at his family's Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church. He attended St. Matthew's Catholic Elementary School in Phoenix and graduated from Alhambra High School where he co-founded their first Black Student Union and served as the organization's first Vice-President. Dr. Whitaker also had a notable high school career, lettering in both basketball and track and field, and becoming a member of the Lettermen's Club.
After high school, he enrolled in South Mountain Community College and later Arizona State University. During the spring of 2001, Dr. Whitaker accepted a professorship at his alma mater, ASU, where he taught for 16 years and founded and directed the Center for the Study of Race and Democracy, winner of the 2014 Arizona Diversity Leadership Alliance (DLA) Inclusive Workplace Award. He has edited three books, including Hurricane Katrina: America's Unnatural Disaster, and he is the author of Race Work: The Rise of Civil Rights in the Urban West. He is currently completing a memoir entitled The Undisputed Truth: A Revolutionary Journey to Black Manhood.
He has also authored a number of award- winning articles and penned over 40 opinion pieces. Dr. Whitaker has won over 30 distinctions for his research, teaching, and service, and has consulted, spoken, and lectured in Australia, Canada, China, Czech Republic, England, Ghana, and Ireland. Has been featured on CNN, NPR, PBS, WVON, KEMET, and is also a co-founder of the Healing Racism Public Dialogue Series, winner of the 2008 National League of Cities Promoting Inclusive Award and the City of Phoenix 2006 Martin Luther King, Jr. Living the Dream Award. In 2015 he was giving the ASU Pioneer Award for working to improve African-American life, community and culture. Most recently he was given DLA's 2016 Diversity and Inclusion Leader Award, the 2022 Best of Tempe (Arizona) Consultants Award, and the 2023 Best of Temps Consultant Hall of Fame Award. He was appointed Executive Director of the George Washington Carver Museum and Cultural Center in February of 2023.
What is your education/training background? DEI Advanced Certification, 2021 (Cornell University); Ph.D. with Honors, History, 2001 (Michigan State University); M.A. United States History, 1997 (Arizona State University); B.A. United States History, 1994 (Arizona State University); B.A. Sociology, 1993 (Arizona State University)
Advice you'd give to your younger self: Slow down, always be your authentic self, and understand that people's perceptions of you say more about their assumptions than your reality.
Who has influenced you? My mother, grandmother, and a long list of teachers from diverse backgrounds.
Tell us about anything you are passionate about outside of your profession(s): Reading, Wushu and Wing Chun Kung Fu, basketball, music (especially rap, jazz and classical) travel, fashion, chess, and science and technology.
Please feel free to tell us anything else that you'd like to share: My favorite quote is "the heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, but they while their companions slept, were toiling upward in the night." - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
